Learning vs. Acquisition Blog #6

Looking at the list on page 48 of Essential Linguistics written by David and Yvonne Feeman (2004) and being asked to label the activities either (L) for learning/word recognition or (A) for acquisition/sociopsycholinguistic made me think about the possible ways for children to receive and practice new learnings.

I found it easy to determine if some of the activities listed were an (A) or (L) as they were very straightforward in terms of where they fit.  There were several on the list that were a little more difficult to define specifically as one or another.

Several of the activities on the list that we as a class decided to mark both (A) and (L) are independent activities I have my Kindergarten students do during our literacy centers.  One of my student’s favorites is, “ask students to look around the room and find words starting with a certain letter.”  We call this ‘write the room.’  The Kindies walk around the room with a clipboard holding a paper that has a word typed down the side relating to our unit of study(an acrostic writing) and a small flashlight and look for something in the room that starts with the same letter of the letter they are looking for.   When we first start this activity my students will use their classmates names to fill in as many of the lines as possible.  After they understand this task, I tell them they can no longer use each other’s names, color words or words from our job chart.  As I think about this activity, it starts out as a (L) learning word recognition activity, one they do after direct explicit instruction, but then as the activity continues to develop I believe it turns more into an (A) acquisition activity.

Another activity that fell into both categories that is part of our center rotations is, “Make alphabet books on different topics.”  During this center activity, which our fantastic technology teacher set up for us, the students start with a blank alphabet book.  They do a picture search for items that start with the same sound as the letter they are working on in their book.  The understanding for this activity began with a (L) activity, learning the letter names and corresponding sounds, and then moved into an (A) activity, as they were able to construct meaning using graphophonics, and semantics.  Students truly own their learning when they are able to apply what they know to activities where they have a choice in what they are doing.  The learning is centered on the student and not on the teacher in these activities.

I believe a balance of the two viewpoints is the best possible approach to teaching my kindergarten students and our ELL students.  As teachers our job is to use best practices in teaching and reach all of our students regardless of where they are academically and socially.  As young students and ELL students begin to learn any new task having the opportunity to practice and use their new learned skill with an acquisition-based style will help them apply and own their new learnings.