Wk 7 Reading Blog

What?

·       For this week, the reading I chose to read that was related to numeracy in early childhood was How Do Parents Support Preschooler’s Numeracy Learning Experiences at Home? (Skwarchuk, 2009). I chose to read this article as this week I wanted to find out more about how parents can support preschooler’s numeracy development at home and how important it is for parents to assist in a child’s development in numeracy at home. I believe this article gave me some insight into how important it is for parents to help in their children’s numeracy learning; however I hope to continue to research into this further.

·       The reading I chose to read that was related to literacy in early childhood was Ecological influences of the home and the child-care center on preschool-age children’s literacy development (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005). I chose to read this article as during the past week I wanted to find out more on how children’s literacy development can be influenced by daily experiences at home as well as experiences at kindergarten or child-care.

So what?

The main arguments I found to be important from How Do Parents Support Preschooler’s Numeracy Learning Experiences at Home? (Skwarchuk, 2009) are:

·       This research study shows that parents who have a great understanding of mathematics and have had positive experiences with mathematics are able to expose children to numeracy concepts that are more complex (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 189).

·       Numeracy involves children gaining a confidence and being able to work with numbers as well as understanding the numerical system (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 190). Numeracy also involves learning to solve problems and measure data to put into graphs and tables (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 190).

·       Parents can support numerical learning and development for young children through formal teaching, exposing numeracy directly and involving children in daily activities that have numerical development outcomes (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 190).

·       In the study, some parents found it difficult to identify mathematical activities in some activities as mathematical skills can be developed in so many activities and these skills can come naturally throughout the day during play time, when children cook with their parents or when they look at a clock etc (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 189).

·       Activities that parents do most to promote numeracy development are adding and subtracting objects, reading numbers, counting, singing number songs and writing numbers (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 192).

·       An early childhood or child-care teacher’s knowledge of mathematical concepts is also important in how children develop numeracy skills, as the more a teacher does know and the more experiences that a teacher can offer in an early childhood setting that are numeracy-related, a child will be able to gain more skills in numeracy (Skwarchuk, 2009, p. 195).

The main arguments that I found from Ecological influences of the home and the child-care center on preschool-age children’s literacy development (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005) are:

·       According to research, children begin to develop literacy skills during their pre-schools years and this is important to take into consideration as literacy development in a child’s preschool years plays an important factor on their academic success (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 204).

·       There are many opportunities in a child’s daily experiences for them to be able to develop many literacy skills including oral language skills, learning new words and practicing emerging literacy skills in their homes and in early childhood settings (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 204).

·       The factors that influence children’s literacy development are a child’s personal experiences, the experiences they have within their home and in their early childhood setting, the interactions they have with their parents, other adults and other children in early childhood settings and at home (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 205).

·       According to the ecological theory, children’s literacy development can also be influenced by other settings such as surrounding areas outside the home in the neighbourhoods, at shopping centres and in environmental settings (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 207).

·       Language and literacy are first exposed in a child’s home so their emergent literacy is first contributed by what they learn in their home and children gain greater literacy skills if their parents provide many literacy activities for children to take part in (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 208). Activities that are enriching for the child such as singing songs, storytelling, creating pictures and rhymes can help to improve a child’s development in literacy (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 208).

·       Parental activities can also contribute to a child’s learning through spending time reading and writing with their children as well as verbal interaction (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 208).

·       Teachers can have a huge influence on a child’s literacy development through their actions such as reading and writing, as when a child sees a teacher reading or writing this could motivate that child to want to read and write (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 208).

·       If an early childhood teacher provides a child with a huge variety of literacy-related experiences and materials and they verbally communicate to the child a lot, this will have a great impact on a child’s literacy development and language skills (Weigel, Martin & Bennett, 2005, p. 208).

Now what?

The implications I have been able to make from How Do Parents Support Preschooler’s Numeracy Learning Experiences at Home? (Skwarchuk, 2009) are:

·       When I am an early childhood educator, I will be able to take into consideration the points I have made from this reading and I will provide many numeracy-related experiences for the children in the early childhood setting so that they will be able to become confident in mathematics.

·       Parents will be able to support their child’s numeracy development at home however some children will be exposed to numeracy-related experiences more than others. So I will need to be able to take this also into consideration and support each child individually in their numeracy development and know that some children will need more learning experiences than others depending on what they’re exposed to at home, in regards to numeracy-related activities.

·       I will need to make sure that I have a great knowledge of mathematical concepts so that I will be able to support children’s numeracy development in the best way possible.

·       Parents need to know that what they do at home with their children can have a huge impact on their child’s numeracy development as the more they expose their child to at home, the more their child will learn. So when I am working with children in an early childhood setting, I will be able to encourage parents and help them to be able to provide numeracy-related experiences for children at home.

The implications I have been able to make from Ecological influences of the home and the child-care center on preschool-age children’s literacy development (Bennett, Martin & Weigel, 2005) are:

·       As an early childhood educator I will be able encourage parents to support their children’s literacy development by getting them to read with their children and encourage parents to provide many literacy-related experiences for their children in at home and in the community.

·       I will also be able to promote children’s literacy development by providing children with many resources and literacy-related activities in the early childhood setting.

·       I will also need to take into consideration  the amount of opportunities children have at home to gain literacy skills as if they aren’t being exposed as much at home then they will need to be provided with more opportunities to gain literacy skills in the early childhood setting.

·       Children are individuals too so they aren’t all going to be at the same level in their learning so this too needs to be taken into consideration when providing literacy-related activities.

 

References

Skwarchuk, S. (2009). How do parents support preschoolers' numeracy learning experiences at home? Early Childhood Education Journal, 37(3), 189-197. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10643-009-0340-1

Weigel, D. J., Martin, S. S., & Bennett, K. K. (2005). Ecological influences of the home and the child-care center on preschool-age children's literacy development. Reading Research Quarterly, 40(2), 204-214,216-233. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/212122252?accountid=10910