funding for this program was provided by... hendrick: communication skills are so important to a growing child. teacher: yeah. can you say hi in hungarian? oh, you're gonna say hi, wave your hand hi. hendrick: there's more and more evidence suggesting that having a good command of language goes hand-in-hand

with the ability to imagine and to think up new ideas. teacher: what do you think would happen if you had pigs in your room? girl: i would kick them out. you would kick them out? hello. i'm joanne hendrick, author of the whole child and your guide to this video series. in this program, we're going to look at not only traditional ways we can help our children learn language, but we'll also explore some interesting new ideas about laying foundations for later success in reading and writing. it's an area of study we call emergent literacy, and i think you'll find it fascinating and helpful. as always in this series, we'll observe children in a number of different programs--

head start, family day care homes, university schools, and private child care centers. and we'll listen to their teachers as they describe some of the methods they use to enhance children's language and literacy development. teacher: no way. hendrick: the task of learning all the intricacies of language can be a daunting one, and it doesn't always go smoothly for our children or for us. [boy "counting"] 5. teacher: so, there are about 5? hendrick: as caregivers, we place such an important role in helping our children learn to be fluent, to communicate with others, and eventually, to read and write. teacher: use your words, adrian. tell lee, "those are my beans." beans. my beans. beans. woman, voice-over: i think it's a really wonderful way to help children express what they know

in terms of experiences. if they go to the grocery store, then if we set up a grocery store for dramatic play, it helps them role play. and i think it helps them to become aware more-- as they're able to act it out-- of what they've experienced. they were aware of it but not really that cognizant. but when they get into the role play themselves, then they have a greater picture of that experience. and it helps their language, i think it helps their interactions with other children. you have to learn how to negotiate, you have to, um, verbally as well as in your actions. and you have to be a creative person in that sense if you're going to be able to work with others and communicate with others. and i think it's just a valuable experience for them.

hendrick: how can we help the children in our care develop their ability to talk, think, and express their ideas to the fullest? and not only that, how do we encourage them to listen to other people? teacher: is that a train track? the pigs are playing with his toys. would you be upset if some pigs came in your room and were playing with your toys? do you think they would break them? what do you think would happen if you had pigs in your room? i would kick them out. you would kick them out? hendrick: we have 4 simple goals in this program: to understand and appreciate the relationship of speech and language to the thought process; to learn new ways we can help foster the development of language and thought in our children; to understand and appreciate the value of language differences among the children in our care; to learn how to foster emergent literacy skills as foundations for reading and writing. teacher: i need to look at your food. teacher: how does that taste? [smacking lips]

it sure sounds good. hendrick: language is so much more than the memorization of grammatic rules or learning the abc's. teacher: you would like more? girl: orange! orange, you're right, that's what it is. it's an orange. orange. more orange. more orange? do we have more orange? how about a cracker? cracker! cracker, ok. cracker. how about a cracker? one... hendrick: real language is also the give-and-take interaction that occurs when people actually try to reach out and communicate with each other to let others in on what we're thinking, what we're feeling, and what's on our minds. teacher: what is it? what do you see? what do you see? what do you see? [laughing] what do you see? listen at you, listen at you... you're giggling.

you're giggling! evelyn... hendrick: did you notice the way this caregiver used very high pitch and then varied the range of pitch from high to low? she also spoke slowly, distinctly, and she repeated words and phrases. this is so important because sometimes we forget that just because babies don't use formal language, that doesn't mean they don't understand exactly what we're saying. by using a special form of language, adults help babies learn that there is a sense of mutual trust and interest, that taking conversational turns is important, and that by pausing and paying attention to the other person, we can respond to what they're saying. teacher: hi! he has not eaten this morning. he was a good little boy... hendrick: don't underestimate their comprehension. children understand a lot of what's said long before they can reply in words. talking about babies right in front of them and assuming they don't understand

conveys a sense of disrespect to them. you wouldn't treat adults or older children that way, and we shouldn't do it to our infants, either. teacher: hi, cutie. hiya! we're constantly singing and talking and showing and exploring. that's a big word that we use in our room, is exploring. they are such little explorers, they're learning how to do so much. and, you know, a lot of people say that babies aren't talking, but they are. i mean, you can just see it every day. their singing, their cues, when they smile at you. i mean, to me, that is talking, that is their way of showing me that they're happy-- or even when they cry, obviously, they need something, and we'll change the situation to see what they need. boy: you know what? i'm gonna go to the zoo and i'm gonna see all the animals. you're gonna go to the zoo and see all the animals? what's your favorite animal at the zoo? at the zoo. can i come? what will we see there?

you'll see lots of stuff in there. lots of stuff? like what kind of stuff? can't look. can't look? ha ha! hendrick: i think the most vital thing to stress about language development is the value of conducting a true conversation with children. this means listening with sincere interest, responding in a way that will enhance and continue conversation, and allowing children time to formulate their ideas and answers. waiting for replies is one of the most important things we can do to encourage language growth. in other words, we need to slow down and take time to really listen to what our children have to say. teacher: his father said, "i'm afraid it won't come up." girl: he's watering it. do you think he's going to water it? let's see. hendrick: take a look at this classroom. what's the first thing you see the teacher doing to help move the learning process along?

teacher: do you think it's gonna come up? [children talking] leah, you said yes. why do you think yes it will come up? girl: because he pulled the weeds and watered. maybe the carrot said, "maybe those people don't know i'm going to come up." hendrick: how do you think this is helping her children learn to communicate not only with her, but with other children in the group? once again, one of the best things we can do for our children is to listen to them. and i mean really listen. i've seen a lot of teachers, especially those who are new and nervous, spend so much time talking-- or worse yet, answering their own questions-- that the children can hardly get a word in edgewise. let's look for opportunities to give our children something real to talk about. it's so easy for a child's attention to wander when we expect them to talk about something abstract or vague or something they've never experienced in real life. children's talk should be based on solid, real, lived-through experiences.

teacher: well, cocoons, what are you doing over here? child: this lives in the pond. are you at the pond now? yes, we're working on the pond. you're building a pond? yeah. what kind of things live at your pond? [children talking] hendrick: for example, asking children to discuss ways they could get water to the sandbox extends their problem-solving abilities while keeping the subject both real and relevant to them. what's more, they can make it even more real by trying out their ideas to see if they actually work. enhancing a child's language development doesn't mean that we have to be continually asking questions or even talking. we can encourage children to ask questions of each other

and engage in interesting conversations among themselves. boy: no, you go to church first, then you go to chuck e cheese. i'm not going to chuck e cheese, only to church. girl: where did you get that thing? teacher: can you tell us about it? see, i ran 4 miles. 4 miles? that is really far. so there was a lot of water in case we got thirsty. oh, good. so they had water. did you get to stop every once in a while? yeah, and get some water. but there were sprinklers every time and we got to ran through them. whoa! and then i--every time when we got water, i splashed it on me. i bet that felt really good. hendrick: encourage conversation and dialogue between teachers and children. there's so much more to language development than learning to name colors or objects on demand. the skills involved in discussion and conversation are vital, too,

and we should give our children opportunities to practice these skills as well. ask open-ended questions-- questions that require more than a yes or no answer. teacher: what did you get a trophy for? boy: i got it from bowling. bowling. the bowling party. hendrick: questions where the teacher doesn't already know the answer. teacher: how do you know you can get a gold medal from ice skating? hendrick: answering open-ended questions presents excellent opportunities for children to generate speech and develop language, because they're engaged in dialogue and sharing ideas rather than simply responding yes or no to a question. all: ♪ creepin' crawler ♪ right up to your chin, chin, chin ♪ ♪ open wide your little mouth ♪ but do not let them in, in, in ♪ [singing in spanish] ♪ give one great big clap

[singing in spanish] ♪ place them on your lap, lap, lap ♪ hendrick: a few words about bilingualism: there's no finer way to honor a child's ethnic or cultural background than by welcoming and encouraging her to use her native language or dialect at school. of course, sometimes this is easier said than done. in the real world, we're often torn in two directions on this question. on the one hand, we want to make the child feel welcome and facilitate the child's learning as best we can by using language she can understand. on the other hand, it is also true that the united states is an english-speaking country, and to get along in our society, children must be able to speak english and speak it well. but speaking english doesn't mean you have to give up speaking the other language. in today's world, speaking more than one language is an asset, and bilingual people are in demand and command good salaries, so it makes good sense to preserve this skill.

boy: go to store. teacher: oh, you're telling me about the money that you might put in a little, teeny hole to get something special at the grocery store. yeah. yeah. some food. some food. and some... i don't know english. and that's english. you're talking in english. you know how to talk in hungarian, don't you? yeah. yeah. can you say hi in hungarian? oh, you're going to say hi, wave your and hi. that says hi in hungarian or in english. even when we are not multilingual and don't speak the child's language, we can at least learn a few essential words and phrases, including and most especially the correct pronunciation of the child's and family's names. teacher: can you say imoja? children: imoja. uh-huh. "and i help light the colorful kwanza candles."

do you remember when we talked about hanukkah? hendrick: the whole point of speaking and communicating with one another is to share, to bring us closer together, to open up and include others in our world, and vice versa. teacher: can you say kwanza? all: kwanza. can you say swahili? all: swahili. swahili is an african language, and those are african words. teacher: ok, ms. anwati, are you ready? take over, let's go. one, two, three...go. ♪ kumbaya hendrick: the most important thing for children to learn about school is that it's a place where they feel warm and comfortable, a place they want to come back to. including songs and stories in the child's native language, using multiethnic pictures, and observing cultural customs not only honors the family by using the language and customs of the home at school, it also does much to foster the children's language and communication skills.

♪ kumbaya boy: hey, that's charlie's. teacher: where's charlie? this is charlie. who's charlie? that is. who's that? that's charlie. is that you? uh-huh. oh, it is? wow. find your eyes. are they the same eyes? yep. wow. it looks like this is a big kid. it looks like that's a big kid? you are a big kid. hendrick: but speaking is only one form of communicating. reading and writing are also an essential part of the language process, and the preschool years play a vital role in laying the sound foundation of skills on which future literacy is built. perhaps now is a good time to talk in more detail about the need and value of a new area of preschool learning we call emergent literacy. emergent literacy means that in order to learn the arts of reading and writing, young children must first acquire many foundation concepts and strategies

that will help literacy emerge. this foundation is just as important as the final strategies needed for actual reading and writing later on. man: friends, what does our chart say up here? girl: helping hands. helping hands, and these are our jobs. what's our first job that we have this morning? children: leader! the leader. i need to pick a leader this morning. let's see whose turn it is this morning. boy: me. this friend right here. who is this? look at this name. it starts with an m-a-r-y. who is that? girl: m-a-r-y! mary's our leader today. what does sherrod start with, friends? children: "s!" "s." sherrody, will you do the calendar for us today? all right, what's our next job? girl: fish feeder! fish feeder, right. girl: yemisi! how do you know that's yemisi's name? because it starts with a "y." because yemisi starts with a "y." girl: and an "m!" teacher: can you read it to me?

read it to me. hendrick: an emergent literacy program means setting up the environment and activities to inspire an appreciation for words, story telling, and communication in all their forms. but while reading lots of wonderful books to our children is essential, there's much more to literacy besides books. man: shall we read it? let's read it. "when i grow up, my job will be "to go to school and to drink and eat. "i will sell money if i pay money. "if you go to the store, if you buy food. "i can play on the big swing if i pay money. "if you don't, you'll have to go to jail. it's at central park. we can eat on a picnic." all right. anything else? hendrick: we can also convey to our children how satisfying and useful the written word is throughout the entire day. we can do this by writing down children's stories at group time, taking their dictation as they paint, helping children dictate and decorate letters to each other or to their parents, or adding written materials such as signs, phone books, and menus to their pretend play.

teacher: are you ready for to write down what you see? what did you see? a purple... girl: cat! a purple cat? ok. it's going to say "kimmy..." boy: i'm going to play with chalk. teacher: ok, there's some chalk on the bottom. boy: i'm going to write my mom. teacher: you're going to write your mom? i'll write mom's name, and you can draw a picture for her. m-o-m. boy: that's mine. that's your mom. hendrick: they key point of emergent literacy learning isn't only that it's so interactive, but that it's so participatory. the children guide and help direct what they want to say, deciding with the teacher what's important to them, and what they want to talk about and describe. the message we want to communicate to the children

is that learning isn't unpleasant work. it can have richly satisfying rewards. and it's an individualized, internal process, not something that can simply be imposed or directed from the outside. that's why it's so important to provide our children with plenty of opportunities for experimentation with reading and writing. drawing, scribbling... pretending to read or repeating nursery rhymes without pressure from anyone to do it right or correctly. teacher: "life is but a dream." can you sing that again? ♪ row, row, row your boat ♪ ♪ gently down the stream ♪ ♪ merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily ♪ ♪ life is but a dream yay! one of the most important things we can do to assist our children in their emerging literacy skills is to advise and encourage parents and family members to regularly read out loud to their children. center time is important, but the home is where so much of the real and lasting learning tes place.

teacher: "went up to their bedrooms. papa bear looked in his bed--" and it's gonna sound good if you all help me in your great big papa bear voices-- let me hear you say, "someone has been sleeping in my bed." hendrick: let's review some of the key ideas we've discussed in this program. we've learned how we can foster children's language development by really listening to them and waiting for their replies. we can provide meaningful and real experiences for them to talk about. we can encourage conversation by using open-ended questions, as well as having children talk to each other, not just to their teachers. we can honor and encourage the expression of each child's native language and culture while teaching standard english at the same time. [singing in spanish] teacher: very good. give yourselves a hand. ok, hello song. get your hello hands ready. martine? hello hands ready?

♪ hello, hello, hello, how are you? ♪ ♪ i'm fine, i'm fine, i hope that you are, too ♪ [same song in spanish] hendrick: and of course, we've talked about how we can encourage the development of emergent literacy in our children by... creating a classroom rich with printed words and materials; sharing the joy of reading; by using drawing, painting, and dictation to help give voice to our children's stories and experiences; and most importantly, we can encourage parents and family members to share the pleasure of reading out loud to their children every day. teacher: he likes to play in the block area, and zack is the... girl: square. square friend.

what friend is this? tiara. this is tiara, tiara fuller. and where does tiara like to play? the quiet area. you're right. she's hearing a story in the quiet area just like you like to do. and tiara is the...what? what friend? duck. she is the duck friend. hendrick: these suggestions for encouraging children's language are especially important when working with children who have special needs. sometimes i even show them. i put my hands, put their hands on my neck and i say, "feel that. that's a voice. that's sound," you know, "that's talking." and i have their little hand up there. and if you do it to yourself, you can feel the motion. and they begin to--i had one kid, at first he was so scared, and i kept saying, "see, i'm talking to you, i want you to talk back to me." i was trying to get him to say apple. and the vibration from up here, he could feel it, and every y--he would not say it for a long time-- he just let me put my hand, his hand up here...apple.

every day, we review it and finally-- and i was so shocked, but consistency of effort-- he came out, he put his hand up here to his neck, and he said "apple." great! yes! yes! that was my expression, you know, and my aide, and after that he started using his voice, and i also emphasized to him, i said, "you talked! you said apple. you talked. yes!" you know, like that, and he was like, "apple!" all day long. all day long. teacher: ...lasagna. zack, turn around so your friends can see. what did you pull out? know what that is? scarf. a scarf. where do you wear a scarf? when it's cold. you wear it when it's cold. hendrick: children with language delays and children who are hearing-impaired should be particularly included in group activities

that stimulate and encourage verbal expression. the more experiences children with special needs have, where they engage in exchanges of ideas with their peers, the more their language will be enhanced. our challenge is to make learning how to speak and communicate a personal and not a cookie-cutter experience. this means whenever possible, allowing each child in our care to develop their speech and language skills at their pace with the understanding that professional intervention may be necessary if certain developmental milestones are not reached. in the universe of the whole child, there are as many ways to learn as there are children to teach. i'm joanne hendrick. see you next time on the whole child. announcer: for young children, learning is a joy. each day brings new discoveries and opportunities. we can make the most of this enthusiasm with everyday materials and experiences. how to develop our children's growing minds,