Hannah Magarian

Literacy Photo Journal

EDC 424
A. Pre-Reflection Activity
Classroom materials, structures, and activities play a large role in literacy development
for grades K-2. As students move through the different levels of literacy as well as phonemic and
phonological awareness, they need to be in an environment that will encourage this development.
By having reminders and reference points surrounding them in the classroom, they are reminded
of what they are learning and can use these resources in their activities. For example, having an
alphabet chart going around the room, yet visible for writing activities to help them accurately
create their letters. Another example would be letters attached to picture, to remind them when
sounding out their words of what sound each letter makes. By having these resources constantly
around them in the classroom, they have reference points to turn to, to promote accurate
development. The room needs to have consistency in the support and the years will probably be
similar to what will continue to stay on the classroom walls. I took pictures from a first grade
classroom to use the materials as well as the teachers point of view to support my initial
thoughts of what a supportive literacy environment should look like.

B&C
Photo 1

Description/Location: This is a word family pocket chart for students to use individually, with a
classmate, or with a teacher. This chart is located in the reading center of the classroom, and there
are different sets of words and families that the students can match and sound out to practice their
rime recognition.

Purpose: The literacy objective for this activity is recognizing rime, which is the building of
phonemic awareness. This activity would be at level for students in the emergent literacy
development stage.

Why This Activity: This activity shows students the manipulation of sounds as well as the
concept of onset-rime. By having this activity in the reading center, the students can adjust the
chart to fit words they recognize in their reading. The teacher keeps the chart at eye level so that
the students can take new words and create new families to practice their rhyming.

Photo 2

Description/Location: This is an alphabet chart that is located in the front of the room, above the
center of the board. Since it is in this location every students desk faces the chart for his or her
reference purposes, they can use it during writing or spelling and have the convenience of seeing
it each time they look up, this way when writing they will have a reference if they forget how to
form a letter, being lowercase or capital.

Purpose: The literacy objective for this alphabet chart is alphabet knowledge, however, this can
also include letter naming, writing, and sounds, depending on the activity the students are using
the chart for, which could be supporting phonics or phonemic awareness. This comes in the
emergent stage of literacy since students are beginning to recognize words and print when they
are first learning their letters.

Why This Activity: By having this chart of the letters with the pictures placed at the front of the
room, not only can students use the chart to help them with their reading and writing, they can
look at the pictures for clues if they forget a letter. This will also enhance students form when
writing letters since they have a constant and clear example for their reference point.

Photo 3

Description/Location: This is another alphabet train, located on top of the book bins in the
reading center of the classroom. Due to this location students can look at the different levels of
the book bins and the letters of the alphabet to match the letters if they need a reminder. Also, if
the students need a reminder their peers names as well as sight words are underneath each set of
upper and lowercase letters to further help them.

Purpose: This chart supports alphabet knowledge as well as helping emergent leaders to decipher
between uppercase and lowercase letters, emergent readers can also use their peers names as
well as the sight words to help with the sounds of each individual letter. Since the words are
underneath the letters, beginning phase readers will be able to recognize the letters without using
the words, they can track their progression when they no longer need to use the alphabet freeze.
This is also supporting the students vocabulary.

Why This Activity: This chart being in the reading center can help students while theyre reading
with letter recognition as well as hints during reading since students names are listed underneath
each letter. Between this and the other alphabet train previously mentioned in the front of the
room, students have constant support as emergent readers.

Photo 4

Description/Location: This board of writing tips is located above the cubbies where children turn
in their assignments. By having this in this particular location, students can check their work
before handing it in, or reference the rules of writing while working on their assignments.

Purpose: The purpose of this board is to illustrate for students the differences between big idea
and main ideas and how to write a complete sentence to illustrate their idea. This helps beginning
readers and writers with their comprehension, as well as vocabulary and fluency.

Why This Activity: This activity located in the writing center gives students clear expectations
when it comes to their writing skills. It also helps the students to stay on task and check if they
were a successful writer with the work that they produced. By having it located where students
turn in their papers, they have that final reminder of the task before passing it in, they can
independently check back without needing the teachers assistance.

Photo 5

Description/Location: This is a pocket chart of the daily schedule and it is located at the rug
where the students hold their daily morning meetings. This shows the class what they will be
doing that day and in which order so that the students know what to expect each day.

Purpose: By having the pictures of each activity along with the word, the students can accurately
use the vocabulary necessary to talk about their day, for beginning readers who can go down the
chart and read the words with little to no help of the pictures. For emergent readers, they can look
down the chart and use the pictures as hints to see what each of the words might be saying for
their daily activities. This use of oral language provides the support for the students to be able to
say what they did/are doing for that particular day.

Why This Activity: This activity is paired with the rest of morning meeting, such as the calendar
and the weather to help students understand what they will be doing and for them to able to read
the schedule as a class to practice their vocabulary around school activities. It is done with
morning meeting so that the students can practice the vocabulary as they move down the
schedule.

Photo 6

Description/Location: This weather pocket chart is located in the back of the room where students
have their daily morning meetings, each day a student comes up to the board and with the help of
their classmates matches the weather of the day with the correct word and picture, and places a
corresponding square as the tally for the weather of that day.

Purpose: This weather pocket chart can help emergent leaders recognize words and use oral
language to practice the vocabulary that corresponds with weather. Since each category in the
chart has a picture next to it, emergent readers can use the pictures as clues to figure out the
weather word and match it accordingly with the days weather. For beginning readers they can
use the chart for recognition and focus less on the pictures and more about reading the words to
match them with the weather of that particular day.

Why This Activity: This activity is done with morning meeting so that students can practice each
morning their vocabulary to describe the appropriate weather conditions for any given day of the
week. This way not only do students have to match the picture of the correct weather term; they
have to place it with the correct word.

Photo 7

Description/Location: This detailed and revised KWL chart is located at the carpet where the
class holds morning meeting and does their reading as a whole class. By having the chart next to
where the teacher sits on the carpet when reading, the students can look together and focus on
their reading and ideas to make sure all of the students are on the same level of understanding.

Purpose: The purpose of this chart is for beginning readers to use the different categories as
checkpoints for their reading, before reading they can decide what they think they know, then
check if their ideas were in fact true to the story, and then if they change their ideas. Lastly the
students can track their new ideas and questions that they have for their reading. This enhances
new words to work on vocabulary skills, comprehension, and fluency when reading.

Why This Activity: This activity encourages beginning readers to read with a purpose, to ask
questions, and to activate prior knowledge. By having this chart where the class reads together,
(or individually with their perspective level book bins) it is a constant reminder of why they are
reading and what they should be focusing on, therefore setting clear expectations.

Photo 8

Description/Location: This easel is located at the front of the room facing the students desks,
since this is where they do the majority of their writing.

Purpose: The purpose for this easel is for beginning readers and writers to practice their fluency
with reading and writing. By having the reminder to think and activate prior knowledge, and to
practice telling with the storytellers voice, they can organize their ideas and fluency before
putting them to paper. This also improves literacy skills by encouraging students to use pictures
with their words. This caters to emergent readers and early stage beginning readers. If students
need help with a word or effectively getting an idea across and they are having trouble with their
writing they can reference pictures around the room or create their own pictures.

Why This Activity: This activity can help emergent as well as beginning phase readers and
writers with their story telling, which can also translate into their reading skills also. By having
this at the front of the room where the students sit for the majority of their reading and writing,
they can reference these key literacy points to further enhance their skills.

Photo 9

Description/Location: This easel faces the reading center as well as the students desks; it is
located in the side of the room near the windows. Part of the reason for this location, according to
the teacher, is for when student begin to lose their focus and look toward the windows they have
reminders to slow down and check their work when they need it the most.

Purpose: This board is important for emergent readers, when learning early literacy skills they
need help to check their knowledge, is the sentence they are reading or writing making sense?
Then they are reminded to check the sound as well as the look, they can do this with the teacher
or a buddy, since emergent readers might not be on this level yet. For the beginning readers, they
can use this to check their work since their knowledge of print and literacy might be more
advanced, and they need reminders to go back and check it over or ask for help since they
mightve gained a new independence. Due to these factors, this supports comprehension as well
as fluency.

Why This Activity: This activity is important for students to understand what they are reading
and writing and not to just read or write, Because the teacher said so. It reminds them that what
theyre doing has a purpose and that they should constantly be checking their work, whether that
be assisted or by themselves.

Photo 10

Description/Location: This is located in the reading corner where the perspective book bins are
located for the class.

Purpose: For emergent readers the idea that the pictures can tell what is happening in the story is
a key piece of understanding for this level of reading. For the beginning readers who are relying
on words more than pictures, the idea that the setting is the location, and the reminder that the
settings can change can remind them from page to page if they are lost or confused when trying to
follow the story, again activating the knowledge of reading with a purpose, therefore furthering
their comprehension.

Why This Activity: This activity is crucial in reminding the students what they are looking for
when reading and some of the different parts if the book that they will encounter. It also is an
activity that students can review while reading as a class, alone, or with a partner.