Literacy: It’s Not Just for Language Arts
Cherry Hill curriculum directors Farrah Mahan and Violeta Katsikis explain why literacy instruction belongs in math, science, robotics and every subject.
Literacy is critical in the language arts, science, math, robotics, and all the other subjects as well.
Literacy is critical in math, science, social studies, robotics…
As Dr. Mahan notes, the new science standards demand that student present evidence to prove their hypothesis. It’s a process that promotes literacy, connecting with scientific and engineering terms while teaching students to formulate coherent arguments and presentations to support their conclusions.
The world is changing faster than curriculum can be updated. Professional development for teachers is therefore critical as teachers need to be self-reliant and motivated. The staff has an essential voice in the content of the curriculum chosen. Master instructors fine-tune the state standards and create lessons based on what kind of students are sitting in front of them each year. The teachers consider many factors including time of day, which of the 19 schools they are teaching in, and dozens of other considerations that affect the relationship between student and teacher every minute of every day.
The district must feel confident in their network of teachers to employ this method of curriculum and must supply targeted, specific, personalized and intensive professional development. As a result, everyone in the Cherry Hill district is a teacher of 21st Century skills in the classroom.
The Cherry Hill district doesn’t use a one-size-fits-all program for its K-12 instruction and curriculum; it uses several different programs based on the need, the student level of proficiency and instruction, and the teacher. There are over 11,000 students speaking 50 different languages in the district, so there isn’t a blanket program that covers all contingencies and needs. They use programs that teach strategies and skills in phonics, psychological awareness, spelling, and handwriting. The online platforms are vital because they allow the student to work from home, and they enable the student to receive feedback, so they continue to learn and improve outside of the classroom.
As both Ms. Katsikis and Dr. Mahan talk about in the interview, it’s not just the words or symbols on the page or the computer screen; they visit all 19 schools and walk through the classrooms, the spaces themselves, to look for evidence of literacy. Like Dr. Mahan says, “What gets monitored gets done.”
This interview was originally posted in the Huffington Post.
Further Reading
- The New York Times – How to Get Your Mind to Read
- edCircuit – Harnessing The Three Domains Of Reading
- The Tennessean – Nashville has a long way to go on child literacy
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