Literacy Dig and Rollerskating

Sitting in class on Wednesday night, I couldn't help but daydream about the exciting adventure I was going to go on after class. Four classmates and myself chose to complete our community literacy dig at a local rollerskating rink. We thought this would be a fun place where children would often come to play and were curious to see what literacy the children were being exposed to. Of course, in order to truly experience literacy from the perspective of a child, we had to become children ourselves. Therefore, renting skates and taking a few laps around the rink was a must! :)

Our adventure began when we all hopped into Nicole's* van and attempted to drive through the snowstorm headed our way. This mighty-miracle-van was a thing of beauty as it smoothly sailed across the icy blanket of snow and safely brought us all to the skating rink. As we walked through the front door, we were all warmly greeted by a delightful DJ who, I might add, was an elderly gentleman presumably in his 70s. At first glance, there were many signs, arcade games, candy/prize machines, and even an air-hockey table. However, there were only a dozen or so children at the rink. Some of these children were eating in the small cafe area, while others were skating with friends or family members. Looking around at everyone, I noticed it was somewhat of a diverse crowd. There were parents and children with different ethnicities ranging from elementary school to high school. The staff members would help people when necessary and also skate along with everyone else. After we got our skates, we heard the DJ announce Men and Women races. I heard a little girl cheering, "Go Daddy!" for her father to win the race. The DJ seemed to play music for about 15-20 minutes and then announce a game to play before playing music again. He played a variety of genres and used age-appropriate versions of songs. 

The sign for the "Rules" had short phrases with giant, capital letters and seemed easier to read than other signs. There was actually numerous opportunities for children to read things. There were words on all the games, menus in the cafe, restroom signs, t-shirts, and wall signs. While roaming around, I heard conversations about crushes at school, children's bed times, and what to eat at the cafe. It was quite interesting to see children eating and talking to each other, while the parents were quietly typing on their cellphones. There were also parents who were holding their children's hands and skating. One mother and son even had matching roller-skates that lit up blue, green, and red in the dark. It was obvious that skating -something they were all probably good at- and spending quality time with their friends and family meant a lot to these children.

 As a newbie roller-skater, I was quite terrified to lace up my skates and make observations of people and activities on the rink. However, determined to become a pro roller-skater by the end of the night, I stood up and wobbled to the edge of the rink. With legs feeling like jello, I joined hands with my classmates and started floating across the floor. Although it was hard not to stare at my own two feet, it was quite amazing seeing little children zip by me at lightning speeds. I held on to the railing along the wall as if my life depended on it, too fearful to let go for I thought I would fall and make a fool of myself. In that moment, I was reminded of how frustrating and frightening it can be to learn something completely new.

As we get older, we forget how difficult it is to learn something for the first time as most things we routinely do become second-nature to us. Things like riding a bicycle, driving, and even solving basic math problems are so familiar to us all, that it is hard to see how someone would not know how to do those things. We forget how we first learned those new things, and even more, we forget what strategies and motivations we had for learning them. The same idea applies for children who are first learning how to read.

"The Donut House" article, written by Rebecca Powell and Nancy Davidson, provides an interesting perspective on schooled literacy versus situated literacy. When introducing literacy to children in an educational setting, the focus should stray away from "learning to read" and move more towards "reading to learn." Incorporating literacy events that are situated in students' lives, or situated literacy, helps children engage texts and stories in a more critical way. Teaching literacy only using workbooks and exercises, while leaving out the historical and lived contexts of student lives only distances students from literacy events. It is no wonder why many children struggle and resist schooled literacy in various ways. This type of literacy carries no real and valuable meaning for children. It offers no room for creative and imaginative thinking.

One useful model that Powell and Davidson describes in their article focuses on the idea of empowerment. This type of model "engages students in real-life literacy and values students' worlds and their ways of making meaning" (pg. 3). When children perceive an authentic purpose for all of their effort and hard work, they will feel more encouraged to learn and be engaged in learning (pg. 7). An example of this from the article was a teacher who helped his students design and build a new playground in their neighborhood the old run-down playground occupied by drug dealers. In instances like these, the literacy skills and strategies learned are more meaningful to the children because of how passionate they were about solving this real-world problem. In this way, children are able to embrace written language, rather that resist it. Students feel empowered when they recognize their capability to solve problems like these.

Who doesn't like to feel a sense of accomplishment when they have achieved something important to them? 

If there are a couple of pieces of advice to take away from this post today, I hope they would be to:

1.) ADOPT AN EMPOWERMENT MODEL!

2.) Take time today to think about how you felt and what it was like when you had to learn something for the first time. Try to learn to count in Base 5! ;)

*Names have been changed to protect the privacy of my classmates!