Portfolio Page - 3.1

Outcome 3.1 – Offers a careful interpretation and analysis of children’s early literacy/numeracy skills and interests

At the kindergarten that I am currently doing my placement at, I was able to observe a child being involved in learning experience that was connected to his interests. This learning experience helped the child to be able to use literacy skills that he currently had and that he was still obtaining. In my observation I will name the child Jack as a pseudonym for confidentiality reasons.

So Jack decided to participate in painting with water colour paints. I sat down next to him and asked him what he wanted to paint. I knew he was very interested in different types of trucks so I asked him if he wanted to paint a truck. He then thought about what kind of truck he wanted to paint and he decided to use his imagination and paint a submarine fire engine. While he was painting the submarine fire engine, Jack was telling me what the different parts were of the submarine that he was painting and also how each of the parts of the submarine operated. Jack also talked about the colours that he was using to paint the submarine fire engine and how these colours had to match each other. He said that the picture had to be humungous. When he said this word I was very surprised as I had never heard him say it before but this shows that every day he is learning new words through his interactions with peers and with adults. He had to paint the picture using three A4 sized papers as the picture had to be very big. Once Jack had finished his painting he got me to write a story describing the submarine fire engine and this is what he said:

“This is a red submarine fire engine. It catches jellyfish and take them through the water tank and through the hose and then to the safe water. It has one ladder, one hose, one water tank. It can float on water and go underneath the water too. It has a fish net to catch fish as well.”

I found this really amazing that he was able to use Jack’s literacy skills to be able to describe the submarine fire engine in great detail. From Jack’s description of his picture there was evidence that he knew a lot about how both fire engines and submarines operate. He knew that submarines floated in the water and knew that fire engines have a ladder and hose. He used a lot of different vocabulary when he was describing his picture to me as he used words that he would’ve learned from his parents or other adults. From observing Jack and the literacy skills he has, it is evident that adults can have a huge impact in a child’s life with helping them to gain literacy skills. A few months ago Jack didn’t know much English at all as English isn’t his first language so to see him now speaking English confidently and having a broad range in his vocabulary, it is rather incredible.

Also he was using numeracy skills as he had to create the shapes of all the different parts of the submarine fire engine.  I also found this really interesting as he knew what each part looked like in real life. It shows he has been exposed to many things involving literacy and numeracy which is good as he has been able to learn a lot. I have also been able to see that if a child is doing something that is related to something they are interested in then they show a lot more interest than if they are doing something that they are not interested in.

From observing Jack, I believe that I have been able to gain a skill in being able to recognise how children do use literacy skills and numeracy skills in the learning experiences that they are provided with. I will be able to use this skill now on each of my placements to be able to observe how children can gain literacy and numeracy skills through what they are doing.

This picture of the submarine fire engine was created on Paint to give an example of what Jack's painting looked like.