Literacy Development

Literacy develops over time as students progress from emerging to skilled readers who can comprehend and analyze complex text. Reading for understanding requires an active thinking process that is influenced by the reader's prior knowledge and experiences (National Reading Panel, 2000). Current national efforts aim at helping every child read independently by third grade.
Strategies for increasing literacy development focus not only on improving reading skills, but also on developing the higher-order thinking skills that enable students to comprehend, analyze, and communicate about ideas. Well-designed literacy programs provide students with frequent opportunities to use language--reading, writing, listening, and speaking--for varied and authentic purposes.
Proficient readers monitor their understanding as they read. When the text doesn't make sense they use strategies that include:
• Activating background knowledge
• Making connections between new and old knowledge
• Self-questioning to clarify and deepen understanding
• Drawing inferences by using background knowledge along with textual clues
• Separating main ideas from details
• Monitoring understanding of text
• Employing fix up strategies to repair confusion
• Using sensory images to understand and visualize ideas
• Synthesizing and extending thinking, going beyond the information given (Tovani, 2004)
Technology offers new tools for effective literacy instruction, and also expands the definition of 21st century literacy. As the International Reading Association's position statement on literacy and technology explains, "To become fully literate in today's world, students must become proficient in the new literacies of information and communication technologies. Therefore, literacy educators have a responsibility to effectively integrate these technologies into the literacy curriculum" (IRA, 2001).