Lesson 1.2: Personal Literacy Narrative and Philosophy Statement
Focus: Write a personal literacy narrative and a philosophy statement regarding your beliefs about the teaching of reading.
Prior to the Collaboration Group Meeting
1. Reflection Journal
Write in your reflection journal prior to the Collaboration Group meeting. You are to respond weekly in your journal, reflecting on your learning, observation, questions, and personal connections. Your reflections need to be at least 250 words. You may choose how to format your journal, though you may want to consider the following as you write:
- What are some new understandings you made this week as a result of the work for this lesson and your work with your students?
- How has this new understanding influenced your current practice?
Bring your reflection journal to the weekly Collaboration Group meeting, and prepare to share your entries.
2. Personal Literacy Narrative
Harris and Hodges (1995) describe literacy as the “minimal ability to read and write in a designated language, as well as a mindset or way of thinking about the use of reading and writing in everyday life” (p. 140). Think back to your earliest memories of hearing and telling stories, reading, and writing. Your personal literacy narrative should be in an MS Word document of approximately 500 words, double-spaced. Listed below are some questions to consider as you write your narrative.
- How did you learn to read, write, and tell stories?
- What are some of your early reading, writing, and storytelling experiences?
- How did these early experiences, both in and out of school, influence your attitude toward reading, writing, and storytelling?
- What do you think most influenced your literacy growth? Why?
- Did you learn in the vernacular, English, or both?
- If you first learned to read and write in the vernacular, what are some significant memories you have about making the transition of reading/writing in the vernacular to reading/writing in English?
3. Philosophy Statement
According to Routman (2000), “Our beliefs about teaching and learning directly affect how and why we teach the way we do, even when we do not or cannot verbalize these beliefs. Therefore, it is important to articulate our beliefs and match them with our practice: If this is what I believe, how does that influence what I do in the classroom?” (p. 17).
Write your beliefs about the teaching of reading. Your philosophy statement should be approximately 500 words. Include your responses to the following:
- What is reading?
- What is the educator’s role in reading instruction?
During the Collaboration Group Meeting
- The facilitator guides the group members in:
- Sharing excerpts from their reflection journal entries by re-asking the questions listed above for the reflection journal.
- Talking informally about their literacy narrative by re-asking the group some of the questions listed above for the personal literacy narrative.
- Talking informally about their philosophy statement by re-asking the questions listed above for the Philosophy Statement.
- The facilitator can also discuss the group’s responses to the following question: What impact do you think an individual’s personal literacy statement and philosophy have on his/her teaching?
- Determine the facilitator, recorder, timekeeper, date, time, and location for the next Collaboration Group meeting.
After the Collaboration Group Meeting
- Email your philosophy statement and personal literacy narrative to the instructor by the end of the second week. Be sure to include your name, date, location, and title on the documents. Also, include your name and lesson title in the file names, for example, moses_philosophy_stmt and moses_personal_narrative.
- The timekeeper emails the attendance to the instructor.
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