Frameworks for Literacy Education Reform

Research is the differentiator between the reliable and the uncertain, the element that provides an unimpeachable credential of practical validation. When advocating for literacy education reforms, stakeholders should settle for nothing less, avoiding the temptations of political expediency that too often limit the prospects for sustained student achievement.What's needed to move the needle on literacy learning within a research-validated perspective. To this end, ILA offers four frameworks for developing and evaluating literacy education reforms, each focused on a specific component of the education sector: literacy teaching and teachers, schools and schooling, student support, families and community.Each framework sets out a list of research-validated approaches to literacy advancement that is designed to function as a blueprint or rubric to inform, refine, and assess proposals for reform. The more such proposals are aligned with these approaches, the stronger their potential will be to produce meaningful and sustained improvements in literacy education. Moreover, each framework includes a detailed list of supporting sources to facilitate exploration into the underlying research base.There is much that can be done to raise students' literacy achievement, and many individuals and organizations must accomplish the work. We must pool resources both within and outside of schools, including those of teachers, school administrators and supervisors, universities, parents, the business community, policymakers, and foundations. Collectively, these stakeholders can have a positive impact on the literacy learning of children and adolescents and, in turn, create a pathway for success for the next generation.These frameworks are meant to provoke conversation and inspire action to use multiple pathways to support the literacy achievement of all children. There is much to be done and there are many to draw from in order to ensure equitable, accessible, and excellent educational opportunities that will result in high literacy achievement for all. This is every child's right and everyone's responsibility. The time to take action is now.

International Education Planning Rubric: State Strategies to Prepare Globally Competent Students

Offers guidance for planning and assessing state strategies to develop students' global competence, including language, communication, and collaboration skills. Lists promising practices in leadership, resource allocation, certification, and curricula

The Motivation to Write Profile-College: A Tool to Assess the Writing Motivation of Teacher Candidates

Writing is an important aspect of literacy regardless of the grade or discipline. State standards have defined the writing genres, crafts, and skills that are to be taught by teachers in PK-12 classrooms. However, in addition to standards, research indicates that a teacher’s own conception of writing is crucial to establishing classroom conditions necessary for young writers to grow, explore and take risks. If this is the job of PK-12 educators, then it is essential for higher education instructors to understand and explore the writing conceptions of teacher candidates. One of these critical conceptions is the motivation to write. The Motivation to Write Profile-College (MWP-C) was designed and validated to assess the writing motivation of teacher candidates. The profile can inform the important conversations necessary to ensure that teacher candidates are fully prepared to teach writing as motivated writers themselves

Educational Technology and Teacher Education: Barriers and Gates in South America

Historically, Educational Technology (EdTech) and Teacher Education (TE) have shared a conflicted relationship, particularly where practicing teachers have not been trained in ET in a manner so that they are able to coherently and efficiently incorporate the new educational technology into their classrooms and schools. In Latin America’s diverse scenario, our analysis is focused on a scenario consisting of Argentina and Uruguay. In this scenario, we identify the social and cultural context where teacher education and teaching practice take place, the EdTech-related programs with the greatest impact, and the “barriers” hindering access to and the application of EdTech, as well as the “bridges” or “gates” that facilitate their effective incorporation to teaching and learning both at schools and in teacher education. Lastly, we propose some courses of action to reduce these barriers and widen the gates connecting EdTech and school settings.Fil: Constantino, Gustavo Daniel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro de Investigaciones en Antropología Filosófica y Cultural; Argentin

Young Children and the Arts: Making Creative Connections -- A Report of the Task Force on Children's Learning and the Arts: Birth to Age Eight

Provides guiding principles and recommendations to organizations to support the development of arts-based early childhood programs and resources

Supporting Parent Engagement in Linguistically Diverse Families to Promote Young Children’s Life Success

This paper examines research that can inform policies aimed at building the capacity of early care and education programs to promote parent engagement in linguistically diverse families. The key questions addressed include:1 )What factors affect linguistically diverse families’ access to early care and education programs?; 2)What do we know about linguistically diverse families and how parents in these families support their young children’s learning and development?; 3) What features of early care and education programs appear to contribute to high levels of parent engagement in linguistically diverse families?; and 4) What policies can help increase the capacity of early care and education programs to support parent engagement in linguistically diverse families

Teachers as writers: a systematic review

This paper is a critical literature review of empirical work from 1990-2015 on teachers as writers. It interrogates the evidence on teachers’ attitudes to writing, their sense of themselves as writers and the potential impact of teacher writing on pedagogy or student outcomes in writing. The methodology was carried out in four stages. Firstly, educational databases keyword searches located 438 papers. Secondly, initial screening identified 159 for further scrutiny, 43 of which were found to specifically address teachers’ writing identities and practices. Thirdly, these sources were screened further using inclusion/exclusion criteria. Fourthly, the 22 papers judged to satisfy the criteria were subject to in-depth analysis and synthesis. The findings reveal that the evidence base in relation to teachers as writers is not strong, particularly with regard to the impact of teachers’ writing on student outcomes. The review indicates that teachers have narrow conceptions of what counts as writing and being a writer and that multiple tensions exist, relating to low self-confidence, negative writing histories, and the challenge of composing and enacting teacher and writer positions in school. However, initial training and professional development programmes do appear to afford opportunities for reformulation of attitudes and sense of self as writer

DEVELOPING COLORING BOOKS TO ENHANCE READING COMPREHENSION COMPETENCE AND CREATIVITY

Developing a reading learning media can be an effort to increase students’ reading comprehension, but there are many teachers who do not put much attention into it. This research aimed at developing a parenting colouring book as a learning media to enhance elementary students' reading comprehension ability and creativity. The method employed was research and development as modelled by Akker. The method consists of three stages, namely analysis, design, evaluation, and revision. The parenting colouring book was firstly validated by experts on the product, which was tested in one-to-one, small groups, and field trial with third graders in one of the elementary schools in Palembang participated in this study. Data collection techniques employed were interviews, questionnaires, and tests. Finally, the study results demonstrate that the parenting-themed coloring book media are categorized as valid, practical, and having potential effect

Preparing Information Literate Teachers: A Review of the Literature

Ye

A review of teachers’ assessment literacy proficiency measures

At present, there are several literature reviews on teachers’ assessment literacy (AL). However, little attention has been paid to a systematic analysis of AL measures. The review on AL measures helps to evaluate the available tools and provide recommendations for developing AL measures in further exploration. Hence, the purpose of the current literature review is to focus on analyzing the measures of teachers’ AL proficiency from 1991 to 2020. Across the contexts, 28 quantitative tools made up of questionnaires or tests were collected. Among them, 10 were designed to investigate overall AL proficiency and 18 were constructed to examine the sub-categories of AL proficiency among teachers. Each instrument was analyzed from the format, guiding framework, item characteristics, targeting population, and psychometric quality. Results showed that the current AL measures were derived more from instrumental than social-cultural conceptualization, examined more on sub-categories than the overall proficiency level, targeted more at in-service teachers than pre-service teachers, and focused more on elementary and middle education than pre- or higher education. Further studies are welcomed from four aspects: construct social-culturally, test generalizability, target at specific groups, and cover various types of AL